HMS Swiftsure (1903)

HMS Swiftsure was a pre-dreadnought battleship of the Royal Navy and lead ship of her class, laid down for Chile under the name Constitución. Chile ordered her from Armstrong Whitworth after Argentina bought two armoured cruisers from Italy, and she was laid down at Elswick on 26 February 1902 and launched on 12 January 1903. Britain bought her as part of ending the Argentine and Chilean naval arms race, and she was commissioned at Chatham Dockyard on 21 June 1904. She had two four-cylinder inverted vertical triple-expansion steam engines, twelve Yarrow water-tube boilers and room for 2,048 long tons of coal. She served with the Home, Channel and Mediterranean fleets and from 1913 was flagship of the East Indies Station. In the First World War she escorted troop convoys, helped defend the Suez Canal and bombarded Ottoman positions in the Dardanelles Campaign, and she was sold for scrap on 18 June 1920.